Lewinsky to study psychology at LSE

Monica Lewinsky, who is taking a masters degree at LSE. Photograph: AP

Monica Lewinsky, who shot to fame as a White House intern under the US president Bill Clinton in the 1990s, is to study for a masters degree at the London School of Economics, the school confirmed today.

The MSc in social psychology includes specialist options in health, media, organisations, culture, technology, community, economic life and gender.

It is not known which options will appeal to the woman who unwillingly gave her name to the sex scandal that nearly led to the impeachment of President Clinton and was virtually imprisoned in her home by media attention. Her stained dress became the butt of smutty jokes around the world.

But it is her academic ability that will have interested LSE. Apart from her unique life experiences, Ms Lewinsky will be building on her degree in psychology from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon, and is likely to be paying £12,000 for her British degree. She is expected to begin her degree next month.

There will be plenty of fellow Americans at the London university, which draws more than half its students from abroad (63% in 2004). Last year there were 935 US students out of a total of 5,439 international students from 125 countries.

President Clinton gave a lecture at LSE in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, but rumours that his daughter, Chelsea, was bored at Oxford and wanted to switch to the London institution proved unfounded.

LSE's Institute of Social Psychology boasts one of the largest concentrations of social psychologists in Europe, with 13 members of staff and more than 100 graduate students enrolled.

The institute's broad project is "to understand, through theoretical development and empirical research, the social processes that emerge at the intersection between the individual and wider societal contexts," states its website.

It adds: "Our research and teaching focuses on organisational behaviour and dynamics, risk in society, communication multiculturalism and discrimination, individual and social health and the community, decision taking and the social production of knowledge".

One of the leading lights at the institute, George Gaskell, lists a special research interest in "risk and trust" - a field Ms Lewinsky might well have opinions on.